THE
first cancer treatments were brutal: in 3000BC, Ancient Egyptians started
removing breast tumours by burning them off with a tool they called a “fire
drill”. Even when chemotherapy arrived in the 1940s, it was essentially poison
that attacked cancer cells and the body alike, resulting in terrible side
effects.人类的第一次癌症治疗非常残忍：公元前3000年，在古埃及，如果有人得了乳腺癌，那么肿瘤就会被活活烫掉。Fortunately,
we are now entering an era of “precision medicine” in which cancer treatments
can be tailor-made for individuals so they get the best responses with the
fewest side effects.幸运的是，癌症治疗进入了“精准医药”阶段。根据个人的身体状况会给予不同的治疗手段，从而取得最好的效果。One
approach being tested involves the use of “personalized vaccines”. We tend to think
of vaccines as a means to prevent disease, like covid-19, but they can also be used
therapeutically. Personalised vaccines are made on a custom basis and train an individual’s
immune system to recognize unique markers on their cancer, so that it can then launch
a targeted attack.其中一个方法就是进行“个性化疫苗”。病人的免疫系统要接受多次训练从而能识别癌细胞，而在注射了个性化疫苗后，就能很好地攻击癌细胞。These
vaccines have only been tested in small clinical trials so far, but the results
have been astonishing (see page 38). One of the first people to try one described
how his lung tumours –which had been so big they were protruding out of his
back – began shrinking before his very eyes. He is now completely cancer-free.虽然这种疫苗测试样本少，但结果惊人。一个得了肺癌的人，在注射了该疫苗后，肿瘤明显缩小了。而如今，这名病人的癌症则消失了。Even some
infamously hard-to-treat cancers, such as those of the brain and pancreas, have
been eliminated in some cases using personalised vaccines. One of the main benefits
is that this approach causes almost no side effects because of its precise
targeting of tumours.通过注射这种个性化疫苗，一些非常难治的癌症如脑癌和胰腺癌都有了好转。而且这种治疗手段几乎没有副作用。Of
course, making a unique vaccine for each person is costly and time-consuming.
But if this continues to have spectacular results, there will be a strong
appetite to drive down cost and manufacturing time.当然，为每个人定制一款疫苗既耗钱又费时间。但是，如果经过试验，治疗效果明显，那么生产的时间和成本就能下降。Before becoming
household names in 2020 for developing covid-19 vaccines, BioNTech in Germany
and Moderna in the US were two of the first companies to begin working on personalised
cancer vaccines. They are now pumping the profits earned from their coronavirus
jabs into larger clinical trials of cancer vaccines, so we can find out for
sure if they work.在研制生产新冠疫苗前，BioNTech和Moderna两家公司已经在研发这种个性化的癌症疫苗了。新冠疫苗的收益给他们提供了更多的资金来进行癌症疫苗的研发。This
suggests there could be a silver lining to the pandemic – it may have sped up a
revolution in cancer care, with not an Ancient Egyptian fire drill in sight. 也许癌症治愈的曙光就在不远处，用火钻烧掉乳腺肿瘤的景象不会再出现。
